Behind a Door
by WaitingHeart6496
Summary: Joey just moved into a new house in Bound Brook, NJ. He finds a door inside his closet that leads to a frightening world full of crazy monsters and a strange army ghost. When he and his best friend Aiden get trapped inside, will they ever get back?
1. Chapter 1

This story was a writing assignment and my teacher really liked it….my friend told me I should put it on Fanfiction so here it is!! Enjoy

I sat in the car, grumbling to myself and staring up at the house. Its white paint (or what was left of it) was peeling off the walls, revealing ugly, brown wood underneath. "Come on Joey! Erik, you too. Get out of that car! Go choose your room!" my mom said excitedly. Erik, my twin brother, muttered something unintelligible and got out of the car, slamming the door angrily. I followed close behind and we trudged up the walkway.

A month ago, our apartment building was turned into an office building and we only had thirty days to find a new home. So we had to say goodbye to our nice city apartment in Manhattan, and hello to Bound Brook, New Jersey. My parents also thought that Erik and I should be raised in "a better place than the city." I mean, we're already thirteen! More than halfway through being raised anyway. My friend Aiden moved to Somerset a year ago, and that town is pretty close. So I wouldn't be totally friendless, at least outside of school.

I walked into the house with Erik, and we looked in awe at the high ceilings, beautiful wood finishes, and grand spiral staircase. For a moment, I forgot how ticked off I was and walked around, admiring the house. Erik and I went upstairs to choose our rooms. I followed a long hallway down to the very last room. I peeked into the room and walked in. I was greeted with a noticeable drop in temperature and a spider skittering across the floor. The room was pretty big, with oak flooring and a huge closet. There was a glass door on the other end of the room, leading out to a balcony. I walked over and pulled the doors open, taking a deep breath of air. Stepping out, I sat in the plastic deck chair that was out there and took in the view. It was the backyard, a small section of forest spread out, with a large green lawn. Not bad. I went back inside and closed the doors. "This room is going to be mine," I decided. Then I heard a truck pull up to the front of the house; the moving truck with all our boxes and furniture. I walked downstairs to get my stuff.

I hauled a few boxes up the stairs. They were labeled "clothes", "shoes", and "corks". The "corks" box holds my collection of corks; over 316 and growing. Yeah, don't ask about how that started. I don't really remember. I trudged up the stairs, boxes stacked in front of me, and walked down the hall to my new room. Dropping the boxes in the doorway, I went down again to get the rest.

It was about 4:00 when all of my boxes were in my room and the movers had brought up my bed and side table. Well, I had nothing better to do so I started unpacking.

I put my corks on the side table, where they were at the apartment. Then I put my sheets on my bed and my three pairs of shoes underneath it. Next, I moved to unpacking my clothes. Opening the closet door, I pushed in the box my foot and turned on the light. As I put my hand on the switch to turn the light on, I felt something push against my fingers. After I flicked the switch, I looked at the object that I felt. Barley noticeable, there was a tiny lever that I could easily flip with my index finger. So that's what I did. And I'll regret it forever. As I pushed the lever down, a panel on the wall (that I didn't see before) slid open noiselessly. I peeked in and could faintly make out a stone stairway, moss growing in between the blocks. There was a strange, cold breeze that came from behind me. Funny, because the door to my balcony was closed, and so was my door. I looked behind me and the closet door slammed shut. I tried to turn the handle. Locked. Great, just great. Now I'm trapped in my closet, with no way out, and this weird staircase. There was only one thing to do.

I stepped onto the first step. Luckily, I had my sneakers on so I didn't have to worry about stepping on anything sharp. I walked down about 20 steps and ended up in a small room with a concrete floor and brick walls. There were other things but they were unimportant. What really caught my eye was the wooden door to my left. It looked like it was centuries old. Splintering, rotting, I put my hand on it. Something told me that opening it here and now was a bad idea. I thought for a moment and decided that I would call Aiden and we'd check it out tomorrow. I would not tell _anyone_ until I found out what it was. I turned and went back up the stairs. Once I was back in my closet I pushed the lever down and the panel slid shut. I heard my closet door click and it popped open. I stepped out and took a deep breath. Then I took out my cell phone and texted Aiden: _U busy 2 Moro? Gotta show u sumthin_. Then I called him.

"Hello?"

"Hey Aiden" I said into the phone "Are you doing anything tomorrow?"

"Nope. I got your text. You're in Bound Brook at your new house?"

"Yeah. It's cool, I guess. But I'm still really mad that we had to leave NYC. But that's not what I need to talk to you about." I sat on my bed playing with my watch and told him the story about the panel in my closet and the stairway, and the door.

"Wow' he said. 'Well I'm not busy tomorrow and I can ask my Mom to drive me."

"Okay. So you can come at like 11, all right? Okay, cool. See you. Bye." I slid my phone shut and got up.

For now I would just ignore the door. I began to put my clothes in the closet, after I turned on my radio. When I was done, I went downstairs to get a snack and tell my Mom that Aiden was coming the next day.

I hope you like it so far!! Please review---no rude reviews though please!! If anyone has any ideas to make it better, I am more than happy to hear them!!


	2. Chapter 2

I hope you like chapter 2!!! This part was the most fun to write!

I blinked the sleep out of my eyes as morning light filtered through my window. In it I saw tiny dust particles that softly touched the wood floor giving the room a dreamy feeling. I glanced at my clock. Its red numbers read 10:06. Rolling out of bed, I took my Led Zeppelin shirt and black jeans from my closet, glancing at the panel on the wall. It is barely noticeable. I walked down the hall, grabbed a towel and went into the bathroom to shower and get dressed. At 10:25 I was downstairs eating a bowl of Rice Krispies and waiting anxiously for Aiden. After I was done eating, I slipped on my green DC's and went outside on the porch to wait for him. The morning was cool – about 60º or so. The trees on my lawn were brown, leaves falling and landing softly on the yellowing grass. My favorite season – fall.

Just then Aiden's Mom drove up in her big, blue minivan and he hopped out of the car and raced up the walkway.

"Hey man," I said, giving him a hi-five and a pat on the back. "So how do you like Jersey?"

"It's cool I guess. But I miss NYC, you know?" Aiden answered.

"Yeah man, completely. We should go inside now." I suggested. I waved to his Mom, Mrs. Hartwick and she responded with a "beep" of the horn and drove off.

We talked a bit about our old friends as I showed him around my house. My Dad was up, making himself some waffles, his usual Saturday morning meal. Mom was getting ready to head out for her first day at her new job with TD Bank. Erik was asleep as usual and next thing I knew we were in my room.

"Man" Aiden said, "It's cold in here."

"Yeah" I explained, "something is off with the heating back here, but I like the cold." We made our way to the closet. I opened the door and told Aiden to keep his shoes on. I found the lever and flicked it up. The panel on the wall slid open. "Come in here, and don't get freaked if you feel wind or if the door slams. As if on cue, the wind kicked up and "slam" the door closed. He gave me a sideways look and then peered down the stairway. Now, you should know that Aiden is the quiet and curious type, unlike me who is loud and impulsive. He slowly descended the staircase, running his hands along the walls on either side of him, as if feeling around for something. We reached the bottom and our footsteps echoed off the walls of the room (which I was calling the cellar). He glanced around briefly and turned toward the door, cocking his head to the side as if to say "is this the one?" I nodded and he put his hand on it as I did yesterday.

"Ready?" he asked, his eyes wide with fear, curiosity and excitement.

"You bet" I said, probably mirroring his look. He turned the ancient handle and the door creaked. For a second I absent-mindedly thought, "Wow, those hinges could use some WD-40." The inside of the door was dark, but Aiden slowly went in. I followed close behind, my hand on his shoulder so we stayed together. My heart was pounding and my breath was ragged. Suddenly, I heard footsteps. Gripping Aiden's shoulder we stopped and peered around. Then, in a split second there was a slam from behind us, and it was pitch black. I caught a scream in my throat. There was a light moving from somewhere in front of me. _Step, scrape, step, scrape._ It sounded like someone walking with a limp. The light got closer and I made out the face of a very old man. He had a lazy eye and crazy, white hair. Both of us, paralyzed with fear, were breathing heavily, sweat forming on my brow and dripping into my eyes, stinging them. The man was now three feet away from us holding a flashlight. With one last _step, scrape_, he stopped. Wordlessly, he put his head down. Strange blue smoke poured from his mouth and enveloped Aiden and I. It smelled sweet, of flowers and sugar. Then it turned green and I felt something heavy appear in my hand. The man looked up, coughed and melted into the shadows.

"That was...freaky." Aiden whispered, his voice barely audible.

"Too true" I said, breathing hard. "And that smoke was odd. I think it put something in my hand." As I said that I began to see a faint light coming from the right. Looking over at it, I realized it was a sun. But not an ordinary sun; this one was at least ten times bigger than the Earth's sun. It rose up over the horizon and I looked around. "Whoa." I breathed. We were standing in a huge expanse of some sort of forest. There were weird-shaped and colored trees, with dark, red trunks. Some flowers were ten feet tall, and very far back was a volcano, orange smoke seeping from the top. I looked down to see what had appeared in my hand. Gasping, I dropped the object and jumped back. Aiden looked at me.

"What?" he asked.

"Look." I replied shakily, pointing to the object. It was a 3-foot long silver sword with a black leather hilt. At the base of the silver, where the metal met the leather, there was some sort of animal footprint.

"That's…weird." He said wide-eyed. Then I noticed something on his belt.

"You too" I responded, pointing. It was a small, curved case with a blue handle sticking out. He slowly took out the handle, revealing a wickedly curved golden blade. The knife gleamed in the newly risen sun. Aiden looked at me in awe. I just shrugged and said "Hey look! There's a house over there. Maybe there's someone in there that can show us a way out." So we started off through the woods (or wherever we were).

Aiden and I arrived at the house. It was a huge, white mansion with and old Victorian wrap-around porch. It would have looked perfectly normal except for the creature on the porch. It sat in a chair, eyes closed, snoring lightly. Now let me explain what it looked like. The head was of a beautiful brunette woman with full red lips and long hair. But then you saw the body. It was a huge rhino body, leathery skin in folds all over. It had three-foot long cockroach legs where arms and legs would go. Sprouting out from its back were huge white wings, moving up and down as the creature breathed. Lastly, a huge gray tail wrapped in front of the creature with a spiked ball at the end.

"Um…excuse me?" I asked cautiously. The creature opened one eye. I gasped – it was blood red!

"How dare you" it began, its voice was shrill and girly. Then it gasped, "How did you get here?" So we explained the door to the creature stumbling over words from fear and confusion. Once we were done, the creature stared out into space, awed by how we came to be here.

"So if you can just let us out…" I asked slowly. That set it off. The red eyes flared and a growl came from deep in its throat. Aiden and I stepped back to leave.

"And _where_ do you think you're going?" it trilled. "Do you _know _who I am?" We shook our heads. "I am Xanthiar, Lord of this land of beasts, and I thought I had ordered _all_ of the portals to _Earth_", it sneered as if it were a revolting thing to say, "to be closed centuries ago!"

"Okay, listen you Lord of Beasts freak," I said. I was getting really mad now. "You seriously think that Aiden and I knew that this was here?" I gestured to the woods with my hand. "You think we somehow opened one of your portal thingies? This is crazy!" Aiden looked at me and we locked eyes.

"Are you insane?" he mouthed. The beast screeched. Now it wasn't just any screech. Imagine the sound a cat would make getting a bucket of water dumped on its head; then add to that a screaming woman and a yelping dog. Now multiply all of that volume by ten. Yeah, not so pleasant. Aiden and I tried to run but the beast whistled and a dozen monsters leaped out from the shadows. They were dressed like security guards except for the blue leathery skin and lion's heads. We looked at each other. A silent agreement passed between us. I grabbed my sword and stabbed forward. I caught a beast in the stomach. He squeaked and melted into a pile of green goo. I battled my way through three others and Aiden did the same. He jumped on their backs and finished them off. This all happened over the course of 15 seconds.

We had caught the Leader person/monster thing by surprise. We sprinted off and didn't look back. Aiden and I had no clue where we were going and were fueled by pure adrenaline. We stopped running after about ten minutes. We found ourselves at the bottom of a huge cliff. Somehow, the sun was already setting and the temperature was dropping. Aiden and I tried to set up a camp to sleep for the night. We used the petals from the huge flower plants as beds and blankets, and used moss as pillows. Also, we put our weapons at the tops of our makeshift pillows.

"Joey?" Aiden said yawning.

"Yup?" I responded.

"What do you think our parents will do when they find that we're gone?"

"I dunno man. Call the police maybe. I wonder what time it is back home. Cause today went by real quick here."

"Yeah", he said sighing. "Well I'm bushed, g'night." And with that he rolled over and closed his eyes.

I started thinking about my new house, and, how, even though I barely knew my way around it, I missed it already. I guess you don't realize what you have until it is gone. I started to lie down and slowly drifted off into a fitful, dreamless sleep.

Please Review!!!! Constructive criticism is appreciated!!


	3. Chapter 3

This chapter is a lot shorter than the others but I hope you like it!!

A growl woke me up. I was breathing heavy and noticed that Aiden was reaching for his gold knife. I did the same with my sword. Footsteps came from somewhere, but then faded. We stood, not talking so that we would not attract any creatures. We kicked away the evidence of our camp and began to walk. We saw a few monsters, bust we just attacked them. Some turned into goo, but others disintegrated, while some just exploded. Aiden and I didn't really know where we were going but we got closer to the volcano. By sunset we were wiped out again, and dirty from fighting beasts. As we set up a camp, the same way as the day before, I heard "step, scrape, step, scrape." "Oh great," I said, "this guy again."

"Jeez, what's with him?" Aiden complained. The creepy old man emerged from the trees. I noticed he was wearing what looked like an old army uniform, tattered, torn, and filthy. This dude has seriously seen some better days. "Um…hey!" Aiden said. The man just put his head down and the blue smoke wrapped around us again. This time, his voice went into my head and I heard him say, "Find the great blue beast that howls at the sun. He will set you free, go east!" His tone was ancient, and cold, like ice, raspy and hypnotic. Then he was swept away in a gust of wind.

Aiden and I looked at each other. "Which way is east?" we said at the same time, and then burst out laughing. Then I noticed a picnic basket on the floor between us. We rummaged through it and found sandwiches, cookies, water bottles and chips. Enough for four people. Aiden and I devoured it all within 15 minutes and went to bed right after. When we woke we started on our way immediately. I knew that the sun rises in the east so we set off in the direction of the rising sun.

The trip east was fine, not a monster in sight. Then we found the "blue beast". It was an eight-foot long blue snake with green scales down the center of its back and a head the size of a suitcase. It was sleeping, coiled in a tight knot and breathing softly. Aiden and I walked up to it slowly. Then he took out his knife and tapped the snake on its head.

We ran back about 6 feet and the snaked stirred and hissed at us, waking up and revealing huge, purple eyes the size of bowling balls. The thing didn't notice us right away. It tilted its head back to the sky and opened its mouth. A howl of anger, annoyance and frustration soared from the beast's throat. It then turned its attention to us, looking us up and down. "Humanssss?" it hissed.

How was it?? Please R&R!


	4. Chapter 4

This is the last chapter…please R&R!

It then turned its attention to us, looking us up and down. "Humanssss?" it hissed.

"Yeah." Aiden growled. "And we want out. Now!" The beast laughed and Aiden stepped forward. "I mean it. Let us out or I'll turn you into a pair of snakeskin boots. Or to put it bluntly – you're dead if we don't get out soon."

"You're bluffing," it said, but I saw fear in its eyes. I think the idea of being made into a women's fashion statement really turned it off.

"No, he's not," I said, pointing my sword toward the snake and stepping next to Aiden. He raised his dagger and nodded. The snake put its head down and muttered something that sounded like a prayer or chant. Next thing I knew, there was a flash of light, a crash, and Aiden and I were in my closet again. My black hair was matted down on my head, and I was breathing heavily. He was leaning against the wall, blond bangs falling in his eyes.

"We need to get out of here," I sighed. Aiden agreed and we ran to the closet door; it was open. Racing downstairs, I found my Mom, Dad, and Erik sitting on the couch talking to a police officer. I burst into the living room with Aiden. My Mom shrieked and threw her arms around us.

"Oh my baby boy!" she said, kissing my head. I pulled away after hugging her briefly. "Where _were_ you two?" We explained in between deep, ragged breaths. "But you were missing for six days," my Mom said. I told her it was only three. Then the police officer asked us to show her where the door was. We walked upstairs and Erik came over and hugged me.

"We though you were gone," he said.

"Without me telling you first? Never dude." I put my arm around his shoulder and we entered my room. I showed them the lever and panel, the wind kicked up and the door closed. We walked down the staircase and I stared in awe. The door was gone. Just a blank wall. Aiden gasped and ran his hand over where it used to be. We stuttered, trying to explain to the now skeptical police officer. We told her about the weird man.

"This stairway was used during war time, many years ago. The owner of this house died down here, trying to hide with his comrades." She took a picture out of her pocket and showed it to us. It was yellowing around the edges and faded. The man in the back was the one that we saw. So now, we had no idea if we were dealing with ghosts, monsters, or just sci-fi fantasy. We walked back upstairs and were talking in the closet doorway for a moment.

"Hey!" I heard Erick say. "I found the door! What's inside? Oh my –" And then: silence. Erik was on the other side of the door. When will he return? I still don't know, but every day I check downstairs in that cellar to see if he's come back. It is now three months later but only one and a half months in that strange world. Whenever I go down there, I pray to that war ghost dude to help Erik come out Okay. He'll return. I can feel it. But until then, the door remains closed, and hidden, a mystery yet to be solved.

How was it?? I hope you enjoyed reading it!! Thank you---WaitingHeart6496


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